Fascinating article on the decline in public trust in America- from 76% in 1964 to just 17% under President Bush, bouncing back to only 19% today. This is the pessimism we will face, and that will be our biggest challenge, and require us to think about new ways to engage people: http://us.ft.com/ftgateway/superpage.ft?news_id=fto030320101534009307

Corruption/Ethics Charles Rangel (D-AT&T/Verizon) is facing major pressure from inside the Democratic Party to step down as Ways and Means Chairman for tax and ethics violations. Asked whether he’d remain Chairman, he answered “You bet your life.” Let’s see how that turns out. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/03/nyregion/03rangel.html Update: He did, in fact, step down as Chairman, and may not run for re-election.

Joe Conasan does a great job taking Republicans to town for this “phony indignation” over Charles Rangel’s actions, including a recap of their stalling during the DeLay investigations and John Boehner’s golfing junkets with commodities traders. http://www.salon.com/opinion/conason/2010/03/04/rangel/‘

Healthcare Luke Mitchell breaks down “regulatory capture”, the way that corporations take over the very regulatory agencies designed to monitor them, and discusses how Big Pharma and the insurance companies “captured” the healthcare debate. http://harpers.org/archive/2009/12/0082740

Military/Pentagon WasteFranklin Spinney explains one reason for the Pentagon budget continually escalating: The 20-member Quadrennial Defense Review oversight group is composed of eleven people with direct ties to weapons industry, and six from hawkish think-tanks: http://counterpunch.org/spinney03032010.html

Regardless of how you feel about Iran sanctions, it seems that a number of corporations are flouting U.S law by doing business with Iran, and still winning federal contracts. Next time you hear that “sanctions aren’t working,” ask how of it has to do with corporations not respecting them: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/0…